Many #COVID19 cautious are posting endlessly about H5N1. I am not going to follow them down the rabbit hole. Avian flu may or may not become a human-to-human pandemic, but...
I continue to believe we're ignoring the immediate and real risk we face with COVID
We don't help mental health by constantly promoting POTENTIAL risks
If it becomes a pandemic, we'll know
If morons want to drink unpasteurized milk and risk death, blindness and illness, I am powerless to stop them, anyway.
For the public, for certain parts of the population, Monkeypox is an immediate and very real hazard, and a threat for many others.
For the public H5N1 is something to be quite aware of, but playing it up as a huge hazard now is questionable.
However, as we have learned from other flu strains, it is only a matter of time until H5N1 gains human transmission. And given its lethality at >50% -warning!
Sometimes people talk like it's obvious to everyone that the #flu is airborne, but I have never seen -- in a pretty liberal area of the US -- a doctor in a respirator mask during flu season in my life (and I'm 32)
A 2013 study using non-respirator surgical masks -- so this is undoubtedly an underestimate -- still concluded that half out of 782 #influenza A transmissions in Hong Kong and Bangkok households happened this way:
"The ongoing outbreak of H5N1 avian flu virus looks a lot like a public-health problem that the United States should be well prepared for.
Although this version of flu is relatively new to the world, scientists have been tracking H5N1 for almost 30 years. Researchers know the basics of how flu spreads and who tends to be most at risk...Yet the U.S. is struggling to mount an appropriate response."
continuing this morning's health theme... here's Robin McKie on the likely next pandemic...
Might be flu, might be SARS-COV2, might be H5Ni related...
but the one thing we can be pretty sure of is it will come & we will not be prepared as we have already forgotten most of the lessons of the lockdown years.
CDC: "This person had exposure to dairy cattle in Texas presumed to be infected with HPAI A(H5N1) viruses. The patient reported eye redness (consistent with conjunctivitis), as their only symptom, and is recovering. The patient was told to isolate and is being treated with an antiviral drug for flu. " #cattle#H5N1#HPAI#influenza#flu#beef
Bird flu detected in person who had contact with infected dairy cattle in Texas
A person in Texas is being treated for #bird#flu,
the second human case of an illness caused by
a highly virulent virus
that has rampaged through 🔸sickened dairy cows in five states🔸 in recent weeks.
The patient, who experienced eye inflammation as their only symptom, was tested for flu late last week with confirmatory testing performed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over the weekend.
The patient is being treated with the antiviral drug oseltamivir.
The case does not change the #risk for the general public,
👉which remains low.
The person had direct exposure to dairy cattle presumed to be infected with #avian#influenza, Texas officials said Monday.
The case has alarmed disease trackers monitoring for the worst-case scenario:
♦️human-to-human transmission of the pathogen, which has happened infrequently worldwide and typically among family members engaged in work with animals. ♦️
And it raises questions about whether this pathogen is now more easily transmitted among mammals.
Epidemiologists have been worried about the🔹 growing number of mammals 🔹infected by highly pathogenic avian influenza — commonly known as #HPAI — around the world.
The avian influenza has been spreading around the world since 2020, and has been documented to infect dozens of other mammalian species, but rarely spreads between them.
Last month, HPAI was found in a baby goat in #Minnesota, the first case in U.S. livestock.
Any suggestions for how to minimise aerosols getting to 8 month old baby on long haul flights and in airports? #CovidIsNotOver#RSV#Flu#Measles Too young to #mask. Can you get a N95 grade muslin or bassinet cover? Would just a physical barrier of a light muslin still be better than nothing? @SiouxsieW@pezmico Thank you for any tips! Plz boost for more input.
"The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as well as state veterinary and public health officials, are investigating an illness among primarily older dairy cows in Texas, Kansas, and New Mexico that is causing decreased lactation, low appetite, and other symptoms.
As of Monday, March 25, unpasteurized, clinical samples of milk from sick cattle collected from two dairy farms in Kansas and one in Texas, as well as an oropharyngeal swab from another dairy in Texas, have tested positive for highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI)."
“Everyone should be getting a coronavirus vaccination annually in a similar manner to the flu shot, according to a new study out today by a team of US researchers.
At-risk groups should also be receiving a second annual #booster shot five months after their first.”
For my USA followers - an #MEAction article on the NIH "Home Test To Treat" program:
"Acute COVID-19 treatment and testing is unfortunately becoming harder and harder to access with the U.S. government public health emergency having been declared ended. The Home Test To Treat pilot program is a way to fill that gap in an accessible and equitable way."
Turns out some kind of flu has caught me (we have only 1 covid test left, and can't buy more so I test that if this gets worse) and my partner.
I hope it is nothing bad and passes quick.
And whom ever we caught this from...I wish you had worn a mask too, so I would not be sick today. I doubt I am the only one you managed to infect, you selfish prick.